Aid climbing: How to retreat from mid pitch
This tip comes from the outstanding book “The Trad Climber’s Guide to Problem Solving: Self Rescue Techniques” from VDiff Climbing. I've read several of his books and I definitely recommend them! Available in print and Kindle format. Shared here with permission.
If you can’t finish a pitch when you’re aid climbing, whether it's a lack of mojo, incoming storm or darkness, it might be smarter to lower off and finish it tomorrow.
If you're less than half the rope length of the pitch, you can probably lower down from your top pieces to your partner. However, lowering off has a couple of potential problems.
It puts a bit less than twice your body weight on the lower off point.
It may start tensioning pieces you've already placed in upward and outward directions, which could compromise them.
For those reasons, it might be better to rappel off your haul rope, which for this example, we’ll assume you have. (Plus, if you're more than half a rope length up, you're gonna have to do this.)
Note that with this technique, you are not cleaning the gear as you go down. The next day, to get back to your high point, you ascend back up the haul rope and continue leading; hopefully with increased mojo, more daylight, and an extra shot of coffee.
When you finish the pitch, you fix the lead rope and your second ascends and cleans the gear, like normal.
Here's how to do retreat from an aid pitch, step by step.
image: VDiff Climbing, shared with permission
image: VDiff Climbing, shared with permission
image: VDiff Climbing, shared with permission